The Cherry Popper
Posted in Max, Mike, Mahler, Blast From The Past, Max May, Blacked Out Girls by Alex on May 6th, 2009, 12:19 am
The first time I truly got drunk – not including a few games of just the tip in Noah’s basement with Sean, a 12-pack of Coors Original, and some oregano – was at my house, sophomore year, after winter exams.
My parents had gone to inspect lava rock in the Canadian Rockies or bike across Kazakhstan or some such thing, leaving me alone on Occom Ridge with sixty bucks, Esker, and a computer that downloaded porn slower than my hand jack would have liked.
My best friend at the time, Rian Wenti, had effortlessly constructed a Power Hour Mix CD on his computer in “The Basement.” Brian’s computer had always been good to us, giving us Hellcats, AOL chatrooms, and Jenny McCarthy’s unbleached pubic hair.
For a couple of handjobs, Bom Tirner got us a 24-pack of Bud Light.
Around noon, we finished our last tests, grabbed our backpacks from our lockers on the downstairs hallway, stared at Tiffany’s tomboy boobs, and high-tailed it to my house.
Up in my room, me, Brian, and someone who I can’t remember (most likely Gabe, which is embarrassing to admit) poured beer into Mexican shot glasses, while Aerosmith, Primus, and Everclear blasted on my 3-disc changer.
60 minutes, 60 shots of beer. Every minute the song changed - in this case from Sweet Baby James to Black Hole Sun.
Brian and I had figured out, repeatedly, that:
1 shot = 1.5 oz
60 shots = 90 oz
1 beer = 12 oz
60 shots = 7.5 beers
Seven-and-a-half beers in an hour. We were assured of being drunk.
All the while, Max was supposed to come over. Yes, that’s right, this story is about Max. He was supposed to come over, but he was at Marty and Nancy’s. They were out of town too, at a furniture expo or a swingers party or something, all of which was expected by that time in our drinking careers - or lack there of. Max kept telling us on the phone that he was just going to take one more tequila shot and then he was going to come over.
After the power hour, I’m not sure exactly what happened. I know that I pulled my pants down in that closet-of-a-downstairs bathroom and Brian took a picture of my hairy ass. We forget that at 16, my ass hair was an international point of interest. I still have the Polaroid someplace in a shoebox, on top of a bunch of letters from a recovering alcoholic I consistently enabled for blacked-out sex in college.
(Do it all again in a second.)
Anyways, back in Hanover, we made our way to the bottom of my hill, where H5 used to pick me and Bill Wittinger up to go to the Ray School.
We were standing around, shitfaced, and Max came running down the hill from the direction of Webster Avenue. It was the end of January, with snow banks surrounding us, and he was wearing that stupid Mardi Gras tee shirt, his faded jeans, and some shitty pair of Asics running shoes. His face and his bare arms were bright red. His grand entrance crescendoed when he rammed face-first into a snow bank at our feet, bursting with joy and excitement from managing to get so drunk.
(Gabe) and Brian went off, probably to check in with their parents, and Max and I marched ourselves straight to EBA’s, where we managed to organize a booth. As we all can imagine, he was completely impossible to deal with. He wanted to hear nothing of him being mentally handicapped in public. He was going to be loud, and stupid, and when I didn’t play along, he was glad to start some sort of altercation to entertain himself.
Max may have gone to the salad bar after ordering, I can’t completely remember, but it makes sense. When his EBA Chicken Sandwich with everything came, he covered both sides in ketchup and carefully folded over the bun.
“I’ll be right back,” he said, as he got up from the booth, his sandwich untouched.
Soon, the waitress came.
Out on Allen Street, Max had projectile vomited all over the sidewalk. I came in time to witness a the steaming, pink trajectory splashing off the concrete onto the brown, melting snow.
“I gotta get out of here,” he said, hunched over and spitting, puke all over the front of that stupid shirt.
Later on that day, Max called me from his house.
“I walked to Ledyard Bridge and got a ride home from Hrian Bunt’s dad.
“I’m never going to drink again.”
May 6th, 2009 at 9:51 pm
That was a lot of fun we should do it again, also right after I left EBA’s i got caught in a brutal blizzard until Jim Hunt picked me up, it was actually a really awful time.
May 8th, 2009 at 2:25 pm
At the risk of rubbing feelings on the subject raw, I would add that we saw the hidden hair of someone a lot more interesting (at the time) than Jenny on that computer.
May 9th, 2009 at 1:11 am
Max?
May 10th, 2009 at 4:45 pm
I once woke up peeing on Venti’s computer.
May 10th, 2009 at 4:50 pm
fucking assholes selling us fucking oregano. dont think i’ve forgotten about that you pieces of shit. the funny part about that is if i hadnt said something alex would’ve thought he got high. fucking assholes.
May 10th, 2009 at 4:59 pm
p.s. i saw a picture of kelly mcgillis in a magazine today, i couldnt believe it. not only is she now a lesbian, she looks fucking wicked old and horrible. i cannot believe i used to snap the carrot to her. wow.
May 11th, 2009 at 1:52 pm
It’s a bear market out there, and high time we made more bad investments.
Let’s buy another website and have two. We’ll start a company making spoof websites.
So far the two ideas from Bend are:
www.ehlist.com - A site completely dedicated to Saul’s photoshoots. Nothing but a rotating picture of Saul, usually shirtless and bronzed.
www.twatter.com - A site where people answer the question “what is your twat doing right now” and answer
you can sign up to follow other people’s twat
picture messaging will prove paramount
May 11th, 2009 at 2:49 pm
I feel the need to comment here because I think I was there for the cherry popper hour and I know I was there when Noah soaked the Venti’s basement.
I believe Venti and I had to head home to the block to subdue our insane mothers (drunk and full of piss and vinegar from all that Green day, Bush and no doubt some of Steve Miller). Anyway how the hell is the Mcgillis?
Also I like twatter, we all Saul looks good with no shirt. Ask any frosh on the green.
May 11th, 2009 at 2:59 pm
damnit
check the first link
May 11th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
DAMNIT!
check the SECOND link
shit…now what do you we do?
www.TWATHER.com ?
May 11th, 2009 at 8:17 pm
I also believe I was at the cherry popper incident though about 15 mins late and tried to play catch up for the remainder of the hour. I dont believe I witnessed Macks vomit but certainly I remember hearing about it. Sean, if you meant who is mcgillis, Kelly Mcgillis is best known as Tom Cruise’s instructor/love interest in Top Gun. If you meant how is mcgillis, she is very bad, at least according to me, she may have something to say about that however.
May 11th, 2009 at 10:58 pm
I was also at this ‘power hour’. I think there were about 10 people there. I remember because I vomited heavily after the hour, then passed out on a couch in Alex’s house until having to wake up a couple hours later to go work a shift at C&A’s.
I also remember Max somehow showing up there after his drunken odyssey across the CT river in that snow storm.
Noah, if I remember correctly it was some sort of crab grass from the football field, not oregano. It took us far too long to be sure about that one.
May 11th, 2009 at 11:32 pm
YES! You guys were all there, no I remember. Tom got threw up like 19 times in the downstairs bathroom.
God, let’s all fly to Hanover right now and do that again. It sounds so fun.
May 12th, 2009 at 3:29 pm
I think my dad dated kelly mcgillis.. wait no that was beth..
May 13th, 2009 at 11:10 am
Alex–That’s such a good idea about everybody flying home. Hanover’s great. We had a sleepover at Mairk’s last night and it was friggin’ amazing.
May 13th, 2009 at 3:28 pm
Alex - I forgot about throwing up at your house, but now that you mention it I remember throwing up at C&A’s several times too in that shitty little bathroom. That was miserable. The power hour was awesome though.
Sean - Remember when you completed the milk challenge at Alex’s? You held it down well for a while there.
May 13th, 2009 at 7:47 pm
The Power Hour everyone is referring to happened Senior Year. I worked that shift with Tom at C&A’s. Probably the drunkest I have ever been in a work scenario. It was awesome.
FREE NIGHT!
The Power Hour Mix was incredible. It’s probably in a CD case somewhere in the Venti house.
I’ll host this get together any day of the Week. Then we can go graffiti LHS, or the Elementary School down the street.
May 14th, 2009 at 11:42 am
Mairk
It was not senior year when Max walked home from EBAs. And quit pointing out embelishments.
May 14th, 2009 at 7:26 pm
Way to go Dan Rather!
May 15th, 2009 at 9:04 am
I’ve never met a bigger group of rosers.
May 17th, 2009 at 3:59 am
In case you guys were worried that somehow our friends had become more responsible, SK managed to piss his pants, then puke all over his shoes solo at my party tonight.
I hate all of you deeply.
May 18th, 2009 at 8:02 pm
If we did the twatter idea SK’s would say: Sean’s twat is covered in piss and puke right now, UGGGGGGH!
May 19th, 2009 at 9:00 am
LOL, Mike. LOL!!!
:):):):)
May 19th, 2009 at 9:19 am
gabe, i think i lost my belt at your house. sorry again for being that guy. if only mike had made it down, then at least i would have had company.
May 20th, 2009 at 12:12 am
Can someone else write something for this piece of shit website please.
Gabe, your talent versus participation ratio is deplorable. You are a complete failure on this terrible website.
May 20th, 2009 at 7:41 am
Keep in mind Alex that Gabe was responsible for that “Googly Gabe’s goofy links” thing which was just awful. I’d like to know where Saul is in all this. I should have some breaking news to report soon.
May 21st, 2009 at 9:00 am
Coming from Noah, the Dostoevsky of this website, that really hurts.
May 21st, 2009 at 9:06 am
I apologize, Noah. I forgot I was dealing with such an accomplished scribe.
http://media.www.tnhonline.com/media/storage/paper674/news/2005/11/08/News/Celebrating.The.Hamel.Recreation.Center-1048953.shtml
May 21st, 2009 at 10:37 am
Gotta start somewhere Gaybe. “An Angel on my Shoulder” is my pride and joy from TNH. You know I’ve also had articles picked up by the AP and published across New England including the Boston GLobe and our own Valley News and been on the front page of three different newspapers along the Seacoast. I have a leg to stand on sir, unlike your stint as a sports editor at Wesleyan (not journalism) or your job as the whipping boy for some guys videotaping narcisists train for a boxing fight (not writing).
May 21st, 2009 at 1:06 pm
Yeah and you also got canned for pooping on your co-workers car.
May 21st, 2009 at 1:06 pm
“The Hamel Recreation Center had a landmark birthday on Monday night and was rewarded with a rousing chorus of the “Happy Birthday” song by all who attended the party.”
You’re a modern day Woodward and Bernstein.
May 21st, 2009 at 1:34 pm
Noah, I’m not going to rip on that article, but I do have a question: Were you blacked out when you wrote it, or was your editor just really shitty? The first three paragraphs are very similar to the last three.
May 22nd, 2009 at 10:00 pm
Two of the last three paragraphs are exactly the same.
On a whole the article is a little better than that douche-bag Don Mahler’s reports on our soccer teams.
Stay tuned for some sort of post-semester Max art show on the web page. That should boost ratings.
May 26th, 2009 at 8:08 pm
I attended the Red Bishop Exhibit a couple Fridays ago. Pure Genius!
June 1st, 2009 at 4:02 am
ehyo - In case anyone caires - http://may312009denali.blogspot.com/
July 31st, 2009 at 8:32 pm
Sean,
Let’s have a picture of you on top so we can see.